The Crowned Skull | Page 6

when I
must leave. It is a long drive to Trevick Grange, but my motor is swift,
and I'll get home very rapidly. I want to have a chat to you before I go
away.'
'With me?' Dericka looked surprised. There was little in common
between this old man and herself.
'Yes.'
He led the way towards a secluded corner where there was a garden
seat, and nodded that she should follow, with the air of a man who is
accustomed to be obeyed.
'Your father and I have been talking about you,' he said abruptly, when
Dericka was seated.
'Yes?' Dericka replied coldly, and fastened her brilliant blue eyes on the
rugged face. She was not going to commit herself by asking questions
until she knew how the land lay. Bowring, as she intuitively saw, was a
man to be delicately handled.
'You seem to be a girl with a head on your shoulders.'

'Thank you for the compliment. But why pay it to me?'
'I have heard of the way in which you manage this house, and your
father, who is, and always was, a simple man.'
'How do you know?'
'Because he was with me out in Africa years and years ago, when you
were a tiny girl. He came home about the time your mother died, and
came home, too, without a penny. Now I,' the millionaire expanded his
chest in a grandiloquent fashion, 'I have made my fortune! I am worth a
great deal of money.'
'So I understand,' said Dericka coldly; 'but what has all this to do with
me?'
'I am coming to that. It has a great deal to do with you. I rented the
Grange from your father, not because I wanted it, but so as to help him.
I pay a fancy rent, upon which he lives.'
'You have no right to talk to me like this,' said Dericka, reddening.
'After all, my father is my father, and your old association in South
Africa does not give you the right to insult him.'
The millionaire was immovable.
'You are a girl of spirit,' he said approvingly. 'I like you none the worse
for it.'
'With your permission,' said Dericka, rising, and speaking sarcastically,
'I will join our visitors and attend to my duties.'
'Join that young popinjay there,' said Bowring, nodding his head in the
direction of Forde. 'I see well what it means.'
'Sir!' Dericka looked angry, and really felt angry. 'My private affairs
have nothing to do with you.'
'They have a great deal to do with me, as your father and I agreed.'

'What do you mean?'
'Let me reply by asking another question, my dear. When Miss Warry
told your fortune did she say who was to be your husband?'
'I refuse to answer that question,' said Dericka with spirit; but all the
same she did answer it by looking again at Forde.
'No,' said Bowring, looking also; 'he is not to be your husband.'
'I chose for myself, Mr. Bowring.'
'What a little spitfire you are. Listen. I want to help your father as he is
my old friend and is poor.'
'I never knew that my father and you were friends.'
'We have both been very thick, certainly,' said Bowring grimly. 'He has
kept away from me, and I from him. But to-day, I came over to make it
up. We have done so, although it was not an easy task. Your father so
far forgot himself as to threaten me with death.'
'Ridiculous!'
'So I told him,' said Bowring quietly; 'but for reasons connected with
South Africa he would not be sorry to see me in my coffin. However, I
managed to make him understand that his interest and mine are
identical, and proposed a new arrangement.' He paused.
'Yes?' said Dericka, interrogatively.
'I intend to pay your father a larger rent and help him out of his present
difficulties, of which you are cognisant, if you--you, Miss Trevick--will
marry my son Morgan.'
Dericka rose with a bewildered air.
'Marry your son--that idiot?'

'He is not quite an idiot,' said Bowring in vexed tones, 'although his will
is weak. All the better for a woman of your managing capability, my
dear. Morgan wants a woman who can handle him firmly, and from
what I have heard of you, Miss Trevick, you are the woman who would
make Morgan a good wife. Also, you are a girl of old family, and the
daughter of a baronet. Against these advantages I set my money. If you
will marry Morgan and turn him into something resembling a man, I
will give you your old family seat of the Grange, and allow you and
your husband ten thousand a year. When I die you will get the lot of my